Desensitized to Everything : The Information Age of Enjoyment Burnout

*I care about everything and don't give a shit about anything all at the same time. No matter what I see, hear or read, there's nothing truly new. It's all the same thing with small twists this way or that way.

Our modern lives are filled with instant digital gratification. Unfortunately this instant gratification is causing many of us to feel depressed, always trying to fill a void with a new thing or an upgrade of something, be that a home, a car, a phone, or you name it.

People are always looking for new movies, new music, new TV shows or something new to read. The difference between "needs" and "wants" have been blurred by material wealth, even poor Americans enjoying large flat screen TV's, a warm home, running hot water, etc.

Advertisements and commercials condition people to engage in unwise credit debt spending, needless consumption, and waste creating lifestyles that are good for "Sales" but perhaps not necessarily good for anything else. Happiness is not for sale, no matter what someone tries to tell or sell you. 

The Age of Instant

Liquid credit faucets open to college students who get spammed with hundreds of credit card applications, many sign up and plug in by dropping debt spending like our Government example on "cool stuff", plugged into the hedonistic treadmill of consumerism, always upgrading, often without cause, like a form of mental illness expressing itself through spending choices. Instant access to content via broadband internet is now even reaching average people through their smartphones. With netflix, pandora, iTunes, Amazon and powerful search engines like Google, instant access to content, news, and information about almost anything is at the fingertips of a generation that tweets and face books their lives. Now you can shop, bank, pay your bills, research, email, etc. all online instantly. Targeted marketing that takes into account your income level, your physical location, the type of home you life in and type of vehicle you use: as the information age progresses the marketing of "materialism" will become even more precise to surgically implant "Consumer" ideas into the minds of everyone from young to old, rich to poor, faith filled or atheist, everyone that has access to the "Screens" of information that the information age exists within.

The Bar Rises

It takes more and more to get that sense of joy that simple things used to give you. As you grow up and embrace "grown up" things, the simple pleasures of childhood are often replaced by elaborate investments and endeavors as adults. With enough liquid discretionary income, lots of normal people are able to embrace of life of increasingly expensive "enjoyments", but it is now well accepted that you cannot buy happiness. Many modern people, normal middle class people, actually live like royalty lived a few hundred years ago. Even have access to hot water 24/7 would have been considered an expensive luxury less than 150 years ago.

True Fulfillment

Once you are able to meet all your basic needs, you are technically able to be as happy as you can be. Perspective is clearly everything. Once you start moving up the socio-economic latter to higher levels of wealth, getting a "feeling" often becomes more expensive and more complicated, fueled by lies from media that tell you that you do not have enough or the right one or that the new one is better. If you "buy into" these lies you will find yourself constantly spending money, racking up debt on mortgages for oversized homes, oversized cars, and oversized everything: America the land where "Bigger" is sold as "Better".

Burnout

Instant internet pornography gives a good example of cognitive burnout. Many men report that after years of looking at adult content online they become completely desensitized to pornography, moving to harder and harder core content to get a feel, but after a while nothing seems to do it.

The initial magic effects of MDMA on its end user is replaced by the speedier aspects of its effect as the magic disappears. Once you "know what it is like" the subsequent experiences tend to be less and less "intense" : getting those magic feelings becomes elusive and impossible to find.

Burnout is the consequence of ongoing exposure and desensitization to content and experiences. Many experience adaptive burnout when listening to music. They buy an album and listen to it repeatedly until the songs sound "over played" where the end user becomes "tired" of listening to certain sound combinations and patterns. Humans are complex beings and we need diversity to keep things interesting, so that things continue to make us "Feel" something.

Emotional burnout is called disassociated depression and detachment, where a person withdraws from life unable to experience normal states of happiness or for that matter any emotions, withdrawing into a cold calculating state of emotional detachment. We see depression and apathy at record rates in "wealthy" countries where the average person enjoys relatively high standards of living, where luxuries that would have been unimaginable even 100 years age are now considered completely average and normal.

Random Acts of Kindness

The motif of your heart is what defines the intentions in your actions. Everything you do as a person starts as ideas in your mind. These ideas are the software applications running on your consciousness brain computer network. Your ideas and feeling combine to control your actions and choices. Your actions and choices define your behaviors, your character as a person developing as behaviors occur together in a sequences in your life that define your history in the future. One day your life will become a memory to other living humans. We will all die one day and leave behind a legacy of impacts. What we choose today will affect tomorrow, and the collective choices of everyone affects the collective trajectory of our future as a people. What kind of legacy are you leaving behind with your choices?

What Happened Polite ? 

Are you inspired to show other people kindness, by holding the door, saying hello in passing, being polite and considerate, and patient with other people? Do you find that simple random acts of kindness like holding the door  no longer seem to be appreciated by strangers ? Are the people around you failing to feel something when someone shows them simple kindness ? Do people around you seem arrogant and antisocial ? Do you know people that are narcissistic and selfish ? Does it make sense that evil people are a common problem that holds back all human systems, businesses, governments, and theological organizations alike. The burnout and desensitization common to our age, causes many of these symptoms and problems. Think about government corruption for a moment.

Ethics for Sale

Do people around you seem to be easily swayed by money, are they easily purchased politicians ? Corruption is the result of sick individuals living in dishonest and immoral way. The lives of evil people are such they they bring harm and imbalances to the lives of other people, people whom they suck dry, of resources to amass wealth in the billions for seemingly insane reasons. Why would Bill Gates the billionaire beneficiary of WinTel/ Microsoft support evil GMO technology, indirectly funding the no campaigns of i522, when an honest person would support the consumers right to know what they are eating. 

GMO Secrets 

If it is GMO we have a right to know what we are eating. Pesticides or GMO's, consumers have the right to know if they are eating engineered and biochemically toxic technologies like pesticides. $25.1 million USD dollars from the GMA and other evil companies to defeat i522 the GMO Labeling act. Does this mean the the people at the certain companies are corrupt and evil, for sale to other evil companies ?  This is clearly an example where chemical and bioengineering companies are attempting to purchase our freedoms to information. We deserve to have access to the truth, and only sleazy evil liars seek to keep us from the truth.

What is with all the corruption ? 

What kind of people are so desensitized to life that harming other people for personal profit seems acceptable to their understanding of what is ok to do to other people?  Essentially many of these crooks and criminals are sociopaths suffering from clinical mental illness that causes evil or is rather the physical and psychological manifestation of evil. Sick evil people are mentally dysfunctional, and other sane people need to stop these people from harming others. Not all of the 1%ters in Washington State or anywhere for that matter are evil. A small group of humans, perhaps several thousand people at most, are truly evil, sick, wealthy and powerful. It is these disturbed sick powerful people that are causing all of the large scale problems that affect everyone negatively.

Individuals Made the Difference

A county is only as a great as its individuals. A state is only as great as the people from that state. A business is only as successful as the ideas of the people running the business. If we want to live in a world of other decent people then we need to hold all people accountable. This is where faith becomes important. Become the change you want to see in the world. Each person needs to be honest, kind and productive if the people want to live in a country that is honest, compassionate and productive.

Faith Helps

Positive social norms encouraged by Faith give rise to social cohesion and peer group developments, partnerships, creations, innovation, technology, and positive changes. When you have a business filled with driven, honest, innovative and kind individuals you get a strong, fair and adaptive business that thrives on quality ethics and customer kindness and complete satisfaction.

Focusing Only on Money

See the GMO farmer does not care about complete customer satisfaction, they are thinking in business terms with GMO how to make a technology profit from agriculture technologies with questionable or toxic safety. Think of the Pesticide manufacturers employees. Are all of the people working for a toxic pesticide company also psychic toxic individuals ? No, the sick ethics of a powerful business come from cleaver dishonest and sleazy people within the company. I am reminded of many business leaders who put the interests of profit above the interests of people.

Life is Not Free

Neither is faith, things that are exceptional tend to also be expensive. You have to choose what it is that you "buy into" as a person, figuratively and literally. Free is when people are being generous with one another. Generosity is an interesting social application that seems to help rich people share the joy ^^ When God blesses someone with lots of wealth that person is supposed to use the money and resources to help other people. Imagine if everyone one that "could", did, imagine if you had a country full of honest successful people. Philanthropy is the richest persons example of generosity. 1%ters are the ones able to throw lots of money at different issues. Some use their wealth to just live in a paradise, others use their wealth to change the world.

The Legacy You Leave Behind

What do you want your legacy on earth to look like if someone is reading a book about you 300 or 30,000 years in the future? Do you want your examples in the book to inspire other people? Do you want to be remembered for creating positive change, for standing up for what it good and right? Do you want to be remembered in a positive light? Do you care about the future?  Our lives on earth are actually very small time-frames in the grand scheme of history. The clock is ticking, every remaining day of your life is clicking off the calendar, every day you live your are one day closer to dying. What are you waiting for, what is holding you back from becoming the best version of yourself ? A kind, balanced, honest, hard working, decent and fair person, you can become a world changing, positive creative, inspiring, kind, honest person if you take on the responsibility and gain the wisdom to understand that every choice you make leaves a legacy behind, on your mind, your body, your soul, and on every future generation. If you care about your family, if you care about you friends, if you care about things of real value that cannot be purchased with money, then you are already thinking about it in the right light.

Choose the Right (CTR) 

Stand up for what is right. Start to care about life, your own and the lives of other people. Life is not trivial or insignificant and our lives affect the lives of other people, even when we are not fully able to understand it. We need to become a brighter, smarter and more creative people to create positive changes and improvements in our future. If we want to make America amazing, we have to make each person amazing. We need to create whole new generations of super kind and super intelligent fun loving people that work together to share and build at better future, a legacy worth writing about.

Let love be the guiding light to your heart and mind, and let kindness and forgiveness set you free from toxic deadly negative emotions or ideas. God loves you and so do I : I love all people, even stupid fools and mean people, evil people : showing other people love is the key to setting the world free from evil. We can rise above and overcome the toxic effects of evil pollution, evil ideas, evil actions, and evil people. The kind honest and creative people can unite to overcome anything, we can, and we will. Together we can make a better future, a better planet, a better civilization. Together we can produce outstanding people, that will produce outstanding companies and countries, and solutions to problems that are impossible to solve without a world of good people.

Here's a List of 29 Different Types of USB Attacks

Researchers from the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel have identified 29 ways in which attackers could use USB devices to compromise users' computers.

The research team has classified these 29 exploitation methods in four different categories, depending on the way the attack is being carried out.

A) By reprogramming the USB device's internal microcontroller. The device looks like a particular USB device (e.g.: charger), but carries out the operations of another (e.g.: keyboard —injects keystrokes).
B1) By reprogramming the USB device's firmware to execute malicious actions (such as malware downloading, data exfiltration, etc.).
B2) By not reprogramming USB device firmware, but leveraging flaws in how operating systems normally interact with USB protocols/standards.
C) USB-based electrical attacks.

Reprogrammable microcontroller USB attacks

1) Rubber Ducky - a commercial keystroke injection attack platform released in 2010. Once connected to a host computer, the Rubber Ducky poses as a keyboard and injects a preloaded keystroke sequence.

2) PHUKD/URFUKED attack platforms - similar to Rubber Ducky, but allows an attacker to select the time when it injects the malicious keystrokes.

3) USBdriveby - provides quick covert installation of backdoors and overriding DNS settings on an unlocked OS X host via USB in a matter of seconds by emulating an USB keyboard and mouse.

4) Evilduino - similar to PHUKD/URFUKED, but uses Arduino microcontrollers instead of Teensy. Also works by emulating a keyboard/mouse and can send keystrokes/mouse cursor movements to the host according to a preloaded script.

5) Unintended USB channel -  a proof of concept (POC) USB hardware trojan that exfiltrates data based on unintended USB channels (such as using USB speakers to exfiltrate data).

6) TURNIPSCHOOL (COTTONMOUTH-1) - a hardware implant concealed within a USB cable. Developed by the NSA.

7) RIT attack via USB mass storage - attack described in a research paper. It relies on changing the content of files while the USB mass storage device is connected to a victim's computer.

8) Attacks on wireless USB dongles - a category of attacks first explored with the release of the KeySweeper attack platform by Samy Kamkar, a tool that covertly logs and decrypts keystrokes from many Microsoft RF wireless keyboards.

9) Default Gateway Override - an attack that uses a microcontroller to spoof a USB Ethernet adapter to override DHCP settings and hijack local traffic.

Maliciously reprogrammed USB peripheral firmware attacks

10) Smartphone-based HID attacks - first described in a research paper for which researchers created custom Android gadget drivers to overwrite how Android interacted with USB devices. The malicious driver interacted with the Android USB gadget API to simulate USB keyboard and mouse devices connected to the phone.

11) DNS Override by Modified USB Firmware - researchers modified the firmware of a USB flash drive and used it to emulate a USB-ethernet adapter, which then allowed them to hijack local traffic.

12) Keyboard Emulation by Modified USB Firmware - several researchers showed how poisoning the firmware of USB flash drives, an attacker could inject keyboard strokes [1, 2, 3].

13) Hidden  Partition Patch - researchers demonstrated how a USB flash drive could be reprogrammed to act like a normal drive, creating a hidden partition that cannot be formatted, allowing for covert data exfiltration.

14) Password Protection Bypass Patch - a small modification of a USB flash drive's firmware allows attackers to bypass password-protected USB flash drives.

15) Virtual Machine Break-Out - researchers used USB firmware to break out of virtual machine environments.

16) Boot Sector Virus - researchers used a USB flash drive to infect the computer before it boots [1, 2].

17) iSeeYou - POC program that reprograms the firmware of a class of Apple internal iSight webcams so that an attacker can covertly capture video without the LED indicator warning.

Attacks based on unprogrammed USB devices

18) CVE-2010-2568 .LNK exploit used by Stuxnet and Fanny malware

19) USB Backdoor into Air-Gapped Hosts - attack used by the Fanny malware, developed by the Equation Group (codename for the NSA). Attack uses USB hidden storage to store preset commands tha map computers in air-gapped networks. Info on networks is saved back to the USB flash drive's hidden storage.

20) Data Hiding on USB Mass Storage Devices - a large collection of tricks of hiding malware or stolen data inside a USB flash drive (eg.: storing data outside of the normal partitions, hiding the file inside an invisible folder by making that folder's icon and name transparent, etc.).

21) AutoRun Exploits - depending on how host computers were configured, some PCs would auto-execute predetermined files located on a USB device's storage. There's an entire malware category dedicated to this called autorun malware.

22) Cold Boot Attacks - aka the RAM dump attack. Attackers can store a memory dumper on a USB flash drive and extract left-over data from RAM by booting from a USB device.

23) Buffer Overflow based Attacks - Several attacks that rely on exploiting OS buffer overflows when a USB device is inserted into a computer. This happens because operating systems will enumerate the devices and functions (run certain predetermined operations) when a USB device is inserted [1, 2, 3, 4].

24) Driver Update - very complex attack that relies on obtaining a VeriSign Class 3 Organizational Certificate and submitting drivers to Microsoft that are automatically delivered and installed on user PCs when a certain SUB device is inserted. This attack is possible, but very hard to pull off in the real world.

25) Device Firmware Upgrade (DFU) - attackers can use the Device Firmware Upgrade (DFU), a legitimate process supported by the USB standard, to update local legitimate firmware to a malicious version.

26) USB Thief - a USB flash drive based data-stealing malware that was recently discovered by ESET.

27) Attacks on Smartphones via the USB Port - attackers can hide and deliver malware (malicious) via USB phone chargers.

28) USBee attack - make a USB connector's data bus give out electromagnetic emissions that can be used to exfiltrate data.

Electrical attacks

29) USB Killer - permanently destroy devices by inserting a USB device that triggers an electrical surcharge.

——

The Ben-Gurion team detailed all these attacks in an article published last year in the ScienceDirect journal.

The purpose of this research was to alert users of the many ways that USB devices can be abused to infect their systems and covertly steal data from protected and air-gapped networks. The research team's recommendation is that USB devices be forbidden or at least strictly controlled in secure networks.

Americans already know

 This book isn't going to reveal anything new, intelligent individuals don't even need to read it. If this book actually conveys something that you haven't surmised, you need to get out of the house more often.

I am sooo sick of people saying, "It's the White man"

 Let me get this straight, the white man makes you smoke weed, he makes you drink? The White man made you have 9 kids at 24 years old, he stops you from reading and studying to at "least" speak English. The White man made you ride down the street with 32" rims, you and your boys all with your hats on backward? He made you beat up your girl, he made you buy an AK "for personal protection", LMAO The White man even stopped you from joining the military and making something of yourself.

 That's some funny shit because the White man never broke into my house, never stole shit off my boats, he signed me up for the Coast Guard and he educated me in the DoD...

 Maybe "some" just approached the wrong White men?

 "Or", you should man up and be responsible for your shit, stop fuckin crying!

I'm not supposed to write this but

 I have a young man in a "college", let's leave it like that, he obtained 90% of his material to pass his classes and write his reports from this blog.
I will not try to steal any of his thunder, all I did was provide the vehicle. I didn't even ask him what posts he got the information from, it's not important. What is important is that he took the bull by the horns, Congrats!

Literacy and Text Messaging, How Will the Next Generation Read and Write

In the age of text messaging, where words are reduced to nonstandard abbreviations and symbols, many people question the future of literacy.

But experts point out that, in fact, technology has put new emphasis on reading and writing.

“A generation ago, a teen who couldn’t read well could still participate pretty fully in the social conversation among peers,” says Timothy Shanahan, president of the International Reading Association. “But with so much written chatter, being able to read and write have become definite social advantages. There is simply much more pressure to know how to read than in the past when it comes to conversation, shopping, or work.”

Shanahan points to the more than 30 billion e-mail messages and 5 billion text messages that are exchanged every day as evidence of how technology “is raising the value of reading in our society, both as an economic and as a social activity.”

Experts also say that technology has added new layers to our understanding of what it means to be literate.

“In coming years literacy will mean knowing how to choose between print, image, video, sound, and all the potential combinations they could create to make a particular point with a specific audience,” says Bronwyn Williams, associate professor of English at the University of Louisville. “What will not change is the necessity of an individual to be able to find a purpose, correctly analyze an audience, and communicate to that audience with information and in a tone that audience will find persuasive, engaging, and intelligent.”

Having multiple literacies, however, does not only mean being comfortable composing with a variety of media; it also means understanding how to use different facets of language in each situation.

“I think we often don’t give kids enough credit with their control over language,” says Eric Paulson, associate professor of literary education at the University of Cincinnati. “They can text ‘IMHO’ on their cell phones, write ‘my own opinion is’ in a school essay, and read ‘it is my belief that your scar hurts when Lord Voldemort is near you’ without getting discombobulated.”

Switching from a language appropriate for a text message to a linguistic mode more appropriate for addressing a teacher or writing an essay is a practice young people can easily be comfortable with.

“Ongoing research is indicating that text messaging and instant messaging often vary with changes in the rhetorical situation,” says Williams. “In other words, when someone texts or IMs someone who is not a close friend, or when the message is about something more serious, the grammar and spelling become less abbreviated and more conventional.”

While texting technologies dominate communication between young people, it isn’t the only trend informing us about how young people read and write.

We also live in the era with lots of great literature for young people. The Harry Potter series went from 320 pages in book one to 652 pages in book six. Millions of children are awaiting an equally heavy book seven for Christmas delivery. Meanwhile, Lemony Snicket’s Series of Unfortunate Events has captivated young readers through a series of 13 books. Unlike earlier book fads, such as Sweet Valley High in the 1980s and Goosebumps in the 1990s, these best-selling books are actually, well, literary.

That does not mean all is well for literacy and communication in the future. It isn’t clear whether all children are comfortable shifting from one form of written communication to another.

A lack of opportunity to develop in multiple language modes could cause language to develop in one way among one group and make those kids unable to communicate with those who have developed multiple literacies.

“Which kids are texting, when, and how?” asks Bertram Bruce, author of Literacy in the Information Age. “Are the same ones reading Lemony Snicket books? Do they read in the same or in new ways?”

“Linguistic class divisions are growing in the U.S.,” says Bruce. “My sense is that young people show enormous potential for creativity–just look at YouTube, graffiti, new music, and so on. At the same time, society tramples that creativity for the many oppressed by poverty and racism, and for the young people who have their lives defined by consumerism and mass production.”

Ironically, the problem may be prevented not by closing the digital divide by ensuring access to text technologies but by providing access to more traditional forms of literacy, like books.

“Text messaging and instant messaging have grown exponentially among kids, and that is likely a positive development,” says Shanahan. “While I see the value of all of this new communication technology, I would argue that we need to protect time for more cognitive or intellectual technologies–those technologies that do more to help us think more deeply rather than those aimed at more-immediate social sharing of information–as well.”

How Do We Learn Prejudice?

There are a number of theories about the origins of prejudice, most of them similar to general learning theories. The simplest, social learning theory, suggests that prejudice is learned in the same way other attitudes and values are learned, primarily through association, reinforcement, and modeling.

Association: For example, children may learn to associate a particular ethnic group with poverty, crime, violence, and other bad things.

Reinforcement: Children may be reinforced for telling derogatory ethnic jokes; others might laugh along or think they're "cool."

Modeling: Children may simply imitate the prejudices of their older family and popular friends.

Children are not born with prejudiced attitudes or with stereotypes. They learn values and beliefs from their family, peers, teachers, the media, and others around them. In other words, children learn prejudice through socialization.

A lot of prejudice socialization occurs outside the home. Prejudice is often a broad social norm of the group in which the individual lives. People learn social norms of prejudice through the process of socialization, usually quite early in life. Most 5 year old American children understand something about the prevailing norms about race.

Parents play an important role in prejudice acquisition. The relationship between parents' and children's attitudes toward members of outgroups is consistent. Not only do parents teach prejudice directly through reinforcement but children often learn their parents' prejudiced attitudes by simply observing their parents talking about and interacting with people from other groups.

As children grow older, peer groups become more important in transmitting social norms about prejudice. Often the attitudes of peer groups match those of a child's parents since friends are typically of similar social backgrounds and values. When peer group and parents hold different values, however, peer group values become increasingly important to children as they grow toward adolescence.

The media are a tremendously important source of social learning about prejudice. Members of socially disadvantaged groups have typically been underrepresented or misrepresented on TV, in popular magazines, and in Hollywood movies. Although we don't see as many examples of stereotyped roles for Blacks and women, for example, as have been previously present, we are now bombarded with images of Black and female tokens in a largely White and male world, and inter-racial friendships that exist only in the workplace rather than in integrated neighborhoods.

It's important to remember that parents, peers, the media and other agents of socialization can also be powerful forces in teaching values that are counter to prejudice. Parents can and do speak respectfully of others. The media has done an excellent job of educating people about HIV-positive individuals. When children are exposed to values such as these, their own values reflect respect for others.

What are other ways we learn prejudice?

Self-Assessment Tests *I Love These

While self-assessment tests can’t tell you what kind of work will make you happy, they can provide useful insight into the process of changing careers or seeking more satisfying work situations. Here are some of our recommendations…

Self-Assessments Tests

Evaluating Your Overall Life Values and Priorities ***Exclusive to WhatsNext.com***

The Life Values Self-Assessment Test (LVAT) is a test developed exclusively for WhatsNext.com.  By going through a systematic comparison of core life values, the LVAT helps users to get a clear sense of what they need to focus on to achieve a more balanced, fulfilling life.  FREE

Planning a Career or Life Transition ***Recommended Test Combination***

Myers-Briggs Type Indicator + Strong Interest Inventory.  The combination of the Myers Briggs and Strong test is particuarly well suited to providing insight for individuals who are considering a midlife career change or major life transition. (Both tests can be found at http://www.cpp.com)

Exploring Your Work Values and Priorities

Career Values and Motivated Skills are two excellent tests that can help you get useful insights into how your values, priorities, and competencies relate to your potential work satisfaction.  Both these tests can be accessed for free at website of Steward, Cooper and Coon.  FREE.

Assessing Your Workplace Strengths and Weaknesses

The Work Personality Index (WPI) by Psychometrics Canada provides a measure of where you stand on seventeen personality dimensions that relate to performance and satisfaction in the workplace. 

Identifying Personal Character Strengths

Values In Action measures 24 core elements of human character that have been found to be universal and define what is best in people.  Results can help you to understand your essential self.  The top-line test results are available FREE.  A more detailed analysis can be obtained for a modest price.

Understanding Your Work Style and How You Relate to Others

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) provides insight into your own personal work style and is designed to help you to understand how to work more productively with other people. The complete MBTI test and a professional analysis can be arranged at https://www.cpp.com/products/mbti/index.aspx.

Lining Up Your Interests With Career Options

The Strong Interest Inventory is an in-depth assessment of your interests and how they line up against a broad range of occupations, work and leisure activities. You can access the Strong Interest Inventory at http://www.cpp.com.

Other Testing Options

You can explore other career aptitude and personality testing options, including FIRO-B, CPI 260 and others by using the special search tool at http://www.cpp.com.

What is "Fake News"?

“Fake news” is a term that has come to mean different things to different people. At its core, we are defining “fake news” as those news stories that are false: the story itself is fabricated, with no verifiable facts, sources or quotes. Sometimes these stories may be propaganda that is intentionally designed to mislead the reader, or may be designed as “clickbait” written for economic incentives (the writer profits on the number of people who click on the story). In recent years, fake news stories have proliferated via social media, in part because they are so easily and quickly shared online.

Misinformation and Disinformation (other types of "fake news")

The universe of “fake news” is much larger than simply false news stories. Some stories may have a nugget of truth, but lack any contextualizing details. They may not include any verifiable facts or sources. Some stories may include basic verifiable facts, but are written using language that is deliberately inflammatory, leaves out pertinent details or only presents one viewpoint. "Fake news" exists within a larger ecosystem of mis- and disinformation.

Misinformation is false or inaccurate information that is mistakenly or inadvertently created or spread; the intent is not to deceive. Disinformation is false information that is deliberately created and spread "in order to influence public opinion or obscure the truth" (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/disinformation). 

Claire Wardle of FirstDraftNews.com has created the helpful visual image below to help us think about the ecosystem of mis- and disinformation. And as she points out, "it's complicated."

Where does it come from?

How misinformation and disinformation is produced is directly related to who the author(s) is and the different reasons why it is created. 

Who are the authors?  They may be:

• Someone wanting to make money, regardless of the content of the article (for example, Macedonian teenagers)
• Satirists who want to either make a point or entertain you, or both
• Poor or untrained journalists - the pressure of the 24 hour news cycle as well as the explosion of news sites may contribute to shoddy writing that doesn't follow professional journalistic standards or ethics
• Partisans who want to influence political beliefs and policy makers

The technological ease of copying, pasting, clicking and sharing content online has helped these types of articles to proliferate. In some cases, the articles are designed to provoke an emotional response and placed on certain sites ("seeded") in order to entice readers into sharing them widely. In other cases, "fake news" articles may be generated and disseminated by "bots" - computer algorithms that are designed to act like people sharing information, but can do so quickly and automatically.

• Why is this important?
• Where do news sources fall on the political bias spectrum?
• How do you recognize bias in yourself and the media?
• How can you read, listen, and/or share news?

What can I do about "fake news"?

• Think critically. Use the strategies on these pages to evaluate the likely accuracy of information.
• Think twice. If you have any doubt, do NOT share the information.